


And Atlas Falls

by CabbageCommander



Category: She-Ra and the Princesses of Power (2018)
Genre: Not Beta Read, Season/Series 03
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-22
Updated: 2020-02-22
Packaged: 2021-02-27 22:00:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 637
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22852888
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CabbageCommander/pseuds/CabbageCommander
Summary: Without the weight of the world, Atlas sleeps.
Relationships: Adora/Catra (She-Ra)
Kudos: 34





	And Atlas Falls

**Author's Note:**

> CW: Coded suicidal ideations. Force of habit to say when I write something that skirts suicidal behavior.
> 
> On with the show!

“Why can’t you just stay?”

The words echo.

_Why can’t you just stay?_

Not even the pounding of her terrified heart, or the ringing, endless hum of the nothing threatening to swallow them whole can drown the words out.

_Why can’t you just stay?_

Here, in this world… There is nothing. No past, no future, and at the end of it all, at the end of the empty building white, there will be nothing. No war. No She-ra. No constant fighting, just endless, infinite… nothing.

Lost, mismatched eyes, full of all the pain and anger she has come to expect to be met with, not in this life but a life worlds away that she only remembers in flashes.

A life simultaneously hers and not. The weight of that life and its far away world settles on her shoulders and she feels the ache of it down to her bones. She is so tired. She thinks, or she tries to think of that life she sees in flashes and feelings. There is so much confusion and pain, but she is not sure if it is residual from this life or that one. Whether she is pining for answers or rest or something else entirely, she doesn’t know.

_Why can’t I just stay?_

Why can’t she just stay? There’s already no Horde to fight against, which means there is no rebellion to run to, right? But, Glimmer and Bow, and all the other princesses, all her friends, will be gone. She thinks of Lonnie, and Rogelio, and Kyle, already gone.

She thinks of a mashed together cake of ration bars.

They had been happy, until her own panic had gotten in the way. Maybe…maybe Glimmer and Bow were happy now. Living lives, they loved, unaware of a war they’d never been apart of in this life. Was that better? Without her, would they keep that happiness until the nothing tearing the world away around her swallowed them too? Would that be better? To be swept away into an unknown oblivion in bliss or be forced back into the war and suffering of that other life.

_Why can’t I just stay?_

A warm, hesitant hand slips into hers, and her thumb runs over soft, fine fur. A grasp that is the most familiar thing in any world, universally grounding.

Catra’s horse, low voice is strained but in Adora’s ears it drowns out the chaos and roaring of the emptiness threatening to swallow them. “Nothing… Nothing really bad can happen as long as we have each other.”

Her hand tightens until she feels the brush of Catra’s claws. The glow of the felines odd eyes pleads with her.

The turquoise blue seems to blink black, iris the same blinding white of the oblivion waiting for them, but it is gone in the same breath.

“You promise?” She hears her own panicked response. She wants so badly to believe those words. To believe this is not terrifying.

“I promise.” Claws scratch gently at the back of her hand and those odd eyes are so soft and earnest that maybe… Maybe…

_Why can’t I just stay?_

Maybe she can. The warmth of the hand holding desperately to hers, and the waiting, pleading eyes; eyes she’s known all her life, both this one and the strange fleeting, fragmented one she can’t fully remember.

Maybe.

“OK… Ok… I’ll stay.” She still feels the nervous, anxiety buzz in her chest, but maybe. If Catra’s right…

She squeezes Catra’s hand and feels warmth climb up her arm.

In that empty nothingness,

There is no Horde or Rebellion.

There is nothing to fight for or against.

There is no life or happiness, or death or sorrow.

Even as the world falls away, even as _she_ falls away into nothing the warmth remains.

Until.

There is nothing.

**Author's Note:**

> If you can believe it, this popped into my head while I was on a walk listening to "Save Tonight" by Eagle-Eye Cherry. Debated having this end as an 'but it was all a dream' and leaving with it heavily implied that Adora wishes she had just stayed, but was talked out of it.


End file.
